Saturday Night Live‘s regrettable case of Bieber fever

Saturday Night Live‘s streak of having pretty boy singers host continued this week with Justin Bieber. Bieber, now 18 years old, is struggling to move beyond his teenybopper persona and enter a more adult phase in his career. As such, he decided to try his hand at comedy, took some “edgy” risks by joking about sex and abstinence, and the big “news” from the episode will probably be that in one sketch, he apologized for recently being caught smoking pot.

But how was Justin Bieber as a host? On a scale from singer-hosts that range from Adam Levine to Justin Timberlake, I’m afraid Justin Bieber bottomed it out. The boy just can not act. As long as he was playing himself or an exaggerated version of himself, Bieber was fine. He did a serviceable job in his opening monologue; was little more than a prop (albeit an inoffensive one) in a sketch about his body doubles that did not make it online; and perhaps the highlight of his episode was in his Valentine’s Day message which 1. was pre-recorded and 2. he played himself.

However, anytime Bieber was asked to be someone other than himself, he broke character, couldn’t keep his eyes off of the cue cards, and more often than not was so hammy as to ruin the sketch. In short, he was a hot mess. Justin Bieber is a handsome and charming enough kid, but he needs to stick to singing and dancing, and leave the comedy to the Justin Timberlakes and Bruno Marses.

nbcsnl.tumblr.com

The episode’s cold open was a spoof of the CBS commenters’ desperation as they stalled for time during last week’s unexpected Super Bowl blackout. It wasn’t a bad cold open — but it took entirely too long to build, and could have used some of the manic energy that it found towards the end of the sketch right up front. In fact, I would have been happy with more “weird commercials” driving the entire bit.

I am asking this in all sincerity: does anyone actually like “The Californians?” I am not trying to be snarky, I have just come to hate this sketch so much that I don’t understand how there can possibly be anyone who actually likes it. Did they spend a fortune on Bill Hader’s wig and they want to get their money’s worth out of it? Did Fred Armisen lose a bet? I DO NOT UNDERSTAND. Also, Justin Bieber, work on your accents, buddy.

With Justin Bieber serving as host, “The Miley Cyrus Show” sketch was just an obvious choice. Framing the bit as Miley Cyrus introducing her new, more adult persona to the world, it opened up an opportunity for Justin Bieber to address and apologize for his recent pot-smoking incident. However, his portrayal of a over-excited Miley Cyrus fan was so broad as to be like something from a bad high school sketch. Sometimes less is more, Bieber.

GLICE! (This bit was also fine, in large part because Justin Bieber didn’t have to do much more than sit there and let Taran Killam scream “GLICE” at his head.)

The spoof of Grease’s “Summer Lovin'” featuring Justin Bieber as an inexperienced Danny Zuko was one of the better moments in the episode, largely because Bieber actually seemed comfortable as he was singing more than he was acting. The bit also helped emphasize the fact that it wasn’t necessarily the material that was off this week (although, it wasn’t particularly strong either), but that an unfunny host with little acting experience can undo even the best writing.

Let me begin by saying that Principal Frye is one of my least favorite recurring characters from this particular cast, so I was not inclined to like this sketch to begin with. But the disappointing thing about it is that the idea of Bieber and Nasim Pedrad’s characters being nerdy abstinence advocates is funny, and sort of a perfect role for Justin Bieber. But then, the whole thing was completely undone by Justin Bieber’s inability to act.

Please don’t invite him back, Lorne Michaels. I don’t care how great the ratings might have been, don’t do it. I am begging you.

Hey, here’s a bonus dress rehearsal clip that didn’t make it to air, either because it spends a great deal of time discussing the particulars of a specific act in bestiality (YOU’VE BEEN WARNED), or because it was insufferably boring.